We are pleased to invite you to celebrate the premiere of The New Historia, featuring the book launch of Elaine Black Yoneda: Jewish Immigration, Labor Activism, and Japanese American Exclusion and Incarceration (Temple University Press, December 2021) by Rachel Schreiber, PhD, Executive Dean, Parsons School of Design. Book launch co-hosted by The Center for Jewish History and The New School's Historical Studies program.

This event will be in-person (please see below for additional details) and livestreamed. 

The New Historia

Launched in March 2022, The New Historia is many things: a network of global researchers painstakingly recovering women in history; a dynamic, growing collection of Schemas that document individual female figures; and a platform for creative collaboration, communication, community-building, and the creation of new knowledge-ordering systems. The New Historia is founded by Gina Luria Walker of The New School, with the additional leadership of Jamer Hunt, Parsons School of Design; and Nancy Kendrick, Wheaton College. 

Elaine Black Yoneda: Jewish Immigration, Labor Activism, and Japanese American Exclusion and Incarceration  

During World War II, Elaine Black Yoneda, the daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants, spent eight months in a concentration camp—not in Europe, but in California. She did this voluntarily and in solidarity, insisting on accompanying her husband, Karl, and their son, Tommy, when they were incarcerated at the Manzanar Relocation Center. Elaine Black Yoneda is the first critical biography of this pioneering feminist and activist. Rachel Schreiber deftly traces Yoneda’s life as she became invested in radical politics and interracial and inter-ethnic labor activism. Schreiber illuminates the ways Yoneda’s work challenged dominant discourses and how she reconciled the contradictory political and social forces that shaped both her life and her family’s. Highlighting the dangers of anti-immigrant and anti-Asian xenophobia, Elaine Black Yoneda recounts an extraordinary life.
Elaine Black Yoneda has been optioned for production as a feature film.

The Center for Jewish History
The Center for Jewish History illuminates Jewish history through archival preservation, public engagement, and digital access to the largest archive for the Jewish experience in the world outside Israel. The collections of the Center’s five in-house partner organizations – the American Jewish Historical Society, American Sephardi Federation, Leo Baeck Institute, Yeshiva University Museum, and YIVO Institute for Jewish Research – comprise over five miles of archival documents in dozens of languages and alphabet systems, over 500,000 volumes of books, 6 million digital items, and thousands of artworks, ritual objects, textiles, and recordings, all spanning 5,000 years. The Center opens these collections to the public and activates the stories they hold.

Please note: Visitors to The New School must show proof of vaccination and a booster. No exemptions will be allowed. All guests must also abide by The New School’s mask requirement policy. Thank you for cooperating with us on our health and safety measures.